AJ Styles made an appearance on the latest episode of Insight With Chris Van Vliet to discuss a wide range of topics. Here are the highlights:
On if there was a point where he felt like wrestling might not work out:
“I don’t know. I feel like things happen pretty quickly. I mean, I got in the ring way before I was supposed to because I could do flips. A month into training I was already in the ring. That’s way dumb. But the opportunity to learn from guys in the ring while you’re wrestling is the best way to learn, and you better learn quick or nobody’s going to want to wrestle you. So I was a sponge. Anytime someone told me something, they only had to tell me once. I was going to make sure that I remembered it, and it just kind of took off from there. Then we had a kind of developmental with WCW. First time I met Bob Sapp. He came in and became friends with him because he was doing his thing for WCW, and a lot of the other guys were there from WCW. So while they were watching their guys, they were able to see Air Paris and myself wrestling, having decent matches and doing some crazy stuff, and that’s how we got our opportunity in WCW.”
What was the first big break for you?
“I think that was it. That was the first big break. I was like wow, I get a chance to wrestle. Before that, I’d done extra stuff in WCW, but it was that chance to get in there and do it in the WCW ring in Baltimore, as a matter of fact, they gave us a trial in Baltimore, Air Paris and myself. Kind of busted out the shooting star to the floor in that match and other things that I’m sure I’d hate watching now. I started in 99 by 2001 I was in WCW, that’s kind of quick. So I was at the right place, the right time, the right guys watching.”
On how close he came to joining WWE in 2001:
“I don’t think it was close at all. [Did they offer you a developmental deal?] So it was after WCW went under. I’d been under contract with WCW for five months. Johnny Ace calls me and said, ‘WWE is not picking up your contract’, and it freaking broke me. So I went and felt sorry for myself for about a good week. And then I was like, Alright, here we go. I’m trying to think how quickly it happened. I want to say that at that moment, I believe the NWA was having their 53rd anniversary, and I believe that was in Petersburg, Florida. Anyway, somewhere down in Florida, and some Japanese guys are going to be down there. I was like, I’m going to go down there, I’m going to wrestle, they’re going to want me. I’m going to go to Japan to wrestle. That’s how I’m going to make it back. I went down there. I wrestled Christopher Daniels for the first time, first time we met, first time we wrestled, and we were just connected, it was perfect. Our timing was the same and Christopher Daniels at that time was if you can’t have a good match with him, you might as well quit. And we gelled so well. After that match, I really started traveling a lot. But I think during that time of doing indies and traveling a lot, I want to say that’s when I was offered [a contract]. I did two dark matches for WWE and I was offered a contract for $500 a week to move to Cincinnati. I’m sure you’ve heard this story before, but I was like wait, so I have to move to Cincinnati and I’ll make $500 a week? The same amount of money I was making at my bottled water job. And I’m gonna have to pay a lot more taxes on that $500 than I’m making now. I’m just thinking all this stuff. My wife can’t move with me. She’s in college about to finish, she’s going to be a teacher. I was like this just doesn’t sound right. And I believed in my heart that I was making the right decision and I even told Johnny as much as I’d love to come up there and train I just could not have my wife move in with their parents. I didn’t think that was right. My job is to take care of her, not the other way around. I mean, I said no to a developmental that’s never promised. HWA was the developmental back then. But you know what? Not only was it the best decision, because TNA would happen shortly after that in 2002, but HWA stopped being a developmental for them shortly after that as well. So I am guaranteed to not have made it through that cut. I wouldn’t have made it, and I wasn’t a big guy. What did I have to offer? There were no smaller guys that did anything in WWE that time. So I think it worked out pretty good based on what happened.”
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